When to draft Brandon Ingram, Jimmy Butler and the stars who will miss months

Six players with real fantasy value will start the season injured, and the question for a drafter is not whether they are good but how many weeks of a roster spot their return will cost. Our projections answer it in two steps. They read each player's injury and turn it into a number of games missed, and our draft board then prices the nights he is out at the value of the free agent who would fill his slot, with an extra charge for an absence long enough to tie up a roster spot for months. Our analysts' consensus rankings do not apply that charge in the same way, which is why the two lists disagree most on exactly these players.

Every injury below is confirmed in at least two outlets, and every rank comes from our points board under ESPN's default scoring unless we say otherwise. The short version is that Brandon Ingram is the one most often drafted too early, Max Strus is the one our projections may be too cautious on, and the rest belong at the end of a draft or on your watch list.

Brandon Ingram, the clearest mistake

Ingram had surgery on his right heel in May after it forced him out of Toronto's playoff series, and his new team, the Clippers, said in late September that doctors found and addressed a partially torn Achilles during that operation and that he will miss the start of the season, as Raptors Republic and Bleacher Report both reported. Toronto had traded him to Los Angeles for Kawhi Leonard over the summer. Our projections read the injury as about 45 missed games and project 22.1 points, 5.8 rebounds and 4.7 assists a game for the roughly 30 he plays, which is a strong per-game line attached to less than half a season. That puts him 142nd on our points board and 174th on our 9-cat board, against consensus ranks of 53rd and 86th. A pick around 50th is a pick spent on a player who will not help you until the new year, and we would not take him inside the top 120.

Jimmy Butler and Shaedon Sharpe, second-half players

Butler tore his ACL on January 19 and had surgery in early February. RotoWire and Yahoo Sports both report that he is months from playing, and the Warriors' hope is a return early in 2027. We project 23 games of 16.5 points, 4.9 rebounds and 4.7 assists in 28 minutes, which is 183rd on our points board against a consensus rank of 124th. Sharpe tore the meniscus in his right knee in an offseason workout, and Blazer's Edge and Yahoo Sports both report a six-month recovery that points to late February at the earliest. We project 17 games, which makes him a stash only in deep leagues with an injured-reserve slot.

Max Strus, where our number may be too cautious

Strus partially tore the plantar fascia in his right foot in a preseason game on October 4, and ESPN and NBA.com both report that the Clippers will re-evaluate him in four weeks. Our projections read the injury as about 30 missed games and project 43, which is more cautious than a four-week re-evaluation suggests, so treat his rank of 190th as a floor. He was a useful three-point specialist when healthy, projected for 2.8 threes a game in 28 minutes, and if he is back by mid-November he is a 9-cat streaming option for threes rather than a draft pick in standard leagues.

Mark Williams and Donte DiVincenzo

Williams had surgery on a torn labrum in his left shoulder in September. ESPN and Arizona Sports both report that he will miss months, and the Suns have not given a timeline. We project 20 games, and his absence is the reason Khaman Maluach's minutes rise in our projections. DiVincenzo ruptured his right Achilles in Minnesota's first-round series, as CBS Sports and Hoops Rumors both reported, and our projections give him no games this season. He has said publicly that he plans to return before the season ends, so he is a name to watch in February rather than one to draft.

What to do

Our board already prices these absences, so in most leagues the right move is to follow it: let Ingram go to the manager who drafts on name value, and take Butler and Strus only after the 170th pick. If your league has injured-reserve slots, holding an injured player costs you less, and you can move Butler and Sharpe a round or two earlier than our rank. Every one of these players will move on our board the night their return date changes, and the projections and Draft Hacker carry those changes automatically. The players who gain minutes from these injuries are covered in Khaman Maluach and the minutes Mark Williams leaves behind.

Every player in this story is on the fantasy basketball rankings and the 2026-27 projections, and the NBA depth charts show where each one stands in his team’s rotation tonight.